


Religion, Politics, and the Great Pumpkin

by Ladytalon



Series: The Doctors Light [25]
Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: F/M, Halloween, Humor, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-04-23
Packaged: 2018-03-25 10:08:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3806479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladytalon/pseuds/Ladytalon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the fifth pumpkin explodes, Kimiyo feels that it’s time to step in.  <b>Earth-14</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	Religion, Politics, and the Great Pumpkin

When the fifth pumpkin explodes, Kimiyo feels that it’s time to step in.

“Would you like some help with that?” 

“ _No_ ,” Arthur snarls. “I’m _fine_.”

“I was only asking because your pumpkin-”

“I meant for that to happen,” he insists. “It’s all part of my master plan.”

“To do what, make a mess? Because you’re certainly doing _that_ ,” Kimiyo points out mildly. He’d been astounded when she’d suggested using the carving tools that the kids had already finished with, and any further attempt to help had just met with outraged glares. “When was the last time you carved a pumpkin?” she asks now, putting the finishing touches on her second work of art.

Arthur gets up to grab another one from the pile that he’d bribed Reverse Flash to bring them – Kimiyo’s not quite sure they’ve all been paid for, so she makes a mental note to take some money to the farm stand on Fifth Avenue once she’s finished counting them all up. “Not that long ago; are you trying to say I’m old?” he asks suspiciously. 

“Of course not,” she soothes. He settles back down at the table and frowns at the pumpkin in front of him, but Kimiyo watches from the corner of her eye as his gaze settles on what she’s doing. “I could teach you how-”

“I don’t need anyone to teach me anything!”

“Old dog, new tricks?”

“There you go again, calling me old.”

“You’re hardly a teenager, Arthur.” She resumes stroking her fingertips over her own pumpkin, burning in the filigree pattern. “This just takes a little more… _precision_ than you’re used to using.”

“I’m precise. I’m the most precise person in a fifty mile radius,” he protests. “Watch this.” Kimiyo scoots back as Arthur places his fingers over the pumpkin stem and twists his hand to burn a circle in the top. This time, the thing is nearly vaporized and he swears angrily. 

She hides a smile, and reminds him that she frequently uses her powers to perform surgery. “Yours are used in a more destructive manner. Maybe it’s just a male thing.”

“Don’t be sexist,” Arthur says grumpily. “This is a mess. God, I hate pumpkins.”

Kimiyo finishes up and carries hers to the counter where the battery-powered candles are, selecting one and inserting it into the cavity. “It looks like a serial killer’s been through here.”

Instead of drawing another hiss of disapproval, her observation is met with thoughtful silence. “It _does_ look like that… doesn’t it?”

The kids come barging in, demanding that Kimiyo get ready to take them Trick or Treating. “Onii-sama, you said you’d go with us,” Imako wails. 

“Yeah, we’ll get a lot more candy if _you_ take us,” Yasu says. “Nobody wants to make you mad by being stingy.”

Arthur’s still looking around with a gleam in his eye that Kimiyo doesn’t quite trust. “You go ahead, and I’ll catch up with you. Tell them I’ll burn their house down if you don’t get at least a handful. Where’s that bottle of ketchup I bought last week?”

“You’ll tell them no such thing,” Kimiyo scolds. “Arthur, I swear…!”

“C’mon, Mom…”

They drag her off, and she gets dressed in the Wonder Woman outfit that Diana was kind enough to lend her. When they leave, Arthur is still moving around the kitchen doing something with those pumpkins, but he reassures them that he really _will_ catch up in a few minutes. He doesn’t even seem to notice what she’s wearing, which _really_ worries her.

Imako heads straight for the neighbors with the most Halloween decorations on the lawn. She’s confident that the more decorations a house has, it means that the occupants will distribute more candy than usual. Yasu just keeps telling her that all it means is that they’ll have spent so much money on decorating that they don’t have much left in the budget for treats. They charge towards the doorbell while Kimiyo hangs back to supervise from a distance, and she sighs when the woman looks around nervously upon recognizing the children. “ _He’s_ not with you?”

“Candy or Doctor Light will destroy your house,” Yasu bellows.

“ _Yasu!_ Marilyn, I _am_ sorry,” Kimiyo apologizes. “He thinks it’s a funny joke, somehow.”

Marilyn smiles weakly. “Kids, huh?”

She herds them off towards their next hapless victim, and they collect quite an amount of loot in the next fifteen minutes before Arthur arrives as promised. Unfortunately for Tammy and Steven Chambers, rulers of the Homeowner’s Association, he makes his appearance directly behind them dressed as the Grim Reaper. Tammy screams and throws her arms up in the air – since she’s the one holding the candy bowl, packets of fruit snacks and trail mix go flying every which way and her husband is almost startled into an asthma attack.

“Trick or Treat,” he says cheerfully. “You guys should come by to see our pumpkins.”

Steven’s hand remains firmly clamped to his chest. “We’ll… we’ll try to stop by,” he pants. “That’s some costume.”

“Yeah, it’s a good one. What’re you two doing giving out _trail_ mix…”

They stay long enough to see that the scattered packets are back in the bowl, then move off. “Let’s not do that again,” Kimiyo says, rolling her eyes at the high fives her family is exchanging. “At least, not unless it’s Hannah,” she amends. “I thought the Grim Reaper is meant to have a scythe?”

Arthur stops dead in his tracks as they walk beneath a streetlight, and pushes back the hood. “Where,” he asks, “did you get _that_.”

He’s finally noticed her Wonder Woman outfit. “Diana loaned it to me on the condition that you keep your hands and beard off of it.”

“My _hands_ don’t have to come anywhere near it, but something else just might,” he says, staring at her admiringly.

Imako hears him, and turns back curiously. “Like what?” 

“Ask your mother.”

Kimiyo shoos her daughter towards the next house. “You never said, about the scythe.”

“Scythe? I’m not the Grim Reaper, I’m a _Dementor_. Honestly, Miko.”

“Demented? That sounds about right,” she says thoughtfully.

“Dementor, Kim. De-men-tor.”

“Is that a Suicide Squad thing, because-”

“Kids, get over here and explain to your aged and hopelessly out of touch mother what it is that I’m supposed to be,” Arthur hollers out, and they groan as they traipse back over.

Yasu bounces from foot to foot impatiently. "Mom, it's from Harry Potter and he's from wizard prison and can we _please_ go to Hal's house 'cause we saw him bring, like, ten whole _cases_ of Pixy Stix from LexMart and Arthur said-"

Kimiyo raises her eyebrows inquiringly. "Yes?"

"He said that they were good and we should get some?"

"Mmm." Kimiyo has a pretty good idea of what Arthur _really_ said about it, and that it involves Evan McCulloch and the man's lingering fondness for a certain powdery substance. She still vividly remembers what had happened when he’d had his stash swapped for piles of salt. "Wizard prison, you say? Seems fitting somehow..."

Arthur pouts and flips his hood up over his head before he drapes an arm across her shoulders. "That's just mean, Princess."

She leans into him, slipping her own arm around his waist. "So tell me more about these Dementors. Are they prisoners in wizard prison and is that their special uniform?"

"Prison guards. They suck out your soul right through your mouth and only chocolate makes you feel better," her son reports, then laughs. "Wow, that _does_ sound just like what you usually do," he tells Arthur.

"You're funny... and oh-so _grounded_."

"No way - you can't ground anyone on Halloween. It's un-American," Yasu argues.

"I'm a supervillain Dementor. I do what I want," Arthur says loftily. "Go make sure Hal gives you a full bag of those things, he said he'd trade me for that bear trap I got off of Zoom last week."

Kimiyo's been wondering what that trap's been hanging around for, but she doesn't really want to know what Arthur's erstwhile Neighborhood Watch companion wants it for. Neither does she care to know where Eobard got it. The kids run on ahead after Yasu is reassured that Arthur was only joking about the grounding, and her lover returns to sexually harassing her. 

"I'm not an invisible plane, but I'll give you the ride of your life."

"I told you, no sex in Diana's clothing."

"But that bustier... c'mon, Miko. Live a little," he wheedles.

"Have I ever asked you to dress up as Booster Gold and have me on the kitchen counter?"

"No, but despite how creepy it sounds I would-"

"What if I asked Lenny to loan you his parka for a quickie?"

"Well, I would _still_ -"

"Cover yourself in mud and call yourself Clayface?"

"Okay, gross."

"Just so we're on the same page."

They walk in silence for a few minutes before Arthur turns to her again. "What if I just-"

"NO." She shoves him away, starting to laugh, and he lunges for her. They grapple playfully before Arthur hauls her into his arms for a kiss, and Kimiyo yanks the strings of his hood so that it closes up around his nose. She laughs to see him paw at it blindly before rescuing him and jumping onto his back. "Carry me, slave boy. I'm tired."

Arthur loops his arms behind her knees and hurries to catch up with the kids, complaining that her lasso is slapping him in the face. The treat bags are nearly overflowing by the time they finish with the first few buildings, so Kimiyo offers to take them back to the house if Arthur will escort them down the street. "I hope you cleaned up after yourself," she warns him as he hands over the first part of their loot. "What did you wind up doing with those pumpkins, anyway?"

"You'll see when you get there. Love you," he adds casually, and Kimiyo smiles.

"You too."

When she gets back, she does indeed see what he's done. Her two carefully carved pumpkins have been placed on the top steps, flanked by Yasu and Imako's, but all around the yard is something that definitely takes attention away from what they've done. The pumpkins that Arthur ruined are scattered all over the lawn, and a few un-carved ones have been strategically placed with plastic knives taped to the sides. They all have terrible grimaces drawn in black marker, ketchup is all over the place, and Arthur has lit the whole scene so that everyone can see it. When she bends to check, even the pumpkin shards have had pained expressions drawn on them.

One of the neighborhood kids runs over with his friends in tow. “Whoa, _cool!_ Hey, Mrs. Light.”

“Hoshi,” she corrects absently, heading up the steps and nearly colliding with the yellow whirlwind of Eobard Thawne. “Watch it!”

“Ssssssorrrryyyyyyy,” he hums on his way past, looping around her a few times to exchange pleasantries. “Ilikeyourcostummmmmme.”

“Aren’t you going to dress up?” Kimiyo asks, finally getting the door open by touch alone since Reverse Flash is whipping up such a wind that her hair is flying in her face.

Eobard slows down suddenly, steals a Baby Ruth from one of the bags, and blurs out to reappear dressed as Barry Allen. “Tttttta-daaa!”

“That’ll get you into all sorts of trouble tonight,” she observes once she’s clawed the hair out of her eyes. “Maybe you should cut down on the candy stealing, though. I’m not sure the world could survive you having a sugar rush.” Just for that, he steals an entire bag from her and takes off; Kimiyo’s left yelling after him and shaking her fist.

She drops off the candy, noticing that Arthur really _has_ cleaned up after himself as he’d said, and heads back to find her three terrorizing the neighborhood. Well, _Imako_ is behaving herself but the ‘two’ boys are busy capitalizing on Arthur’s costume by horsing around. She watches him float after Yasu, who’s screaming “Expecto Patronum!” in a panicked-sounding voice while the neighborhood kids scream and run away. Arthur makes it look as if a ghostly hippo charges out of Yasu’s brandished Pixy Stix and he goes flapping away while it chases him.

“Eobard stole some of your candy,” she announces as Arthur reappears, making Yasu laugh by hiking his robes up around his knees and ‘running’ in midair. “I also saw your pumpkins and would you get _down_ from there, please.”

He drops to the ground obediently, and beneath the hood she can see his hopeful smile. “What did you think of our yard display?”

Arthur looks just like an overgrown child, and Kimiyo laughs up at him. “Very creative. Now, why don’t we just let those two finish trick-or-treating? If you’re good, maybe you’ll get a treat of your own.”

“I thought you said the costume was off-limits,” he says, but moves closer just the same.

Kimiyo steeples her fingers on his chest, temporarily holding him at bay. “I said it and I meant it. You’ll just have to restrain yourself until it’s back on a hanger.”

“I can work with that,” Arthur promises.

He circles around behind her and opens his robe wide enough for her to step back against him, then Arthur closes it up so that she can get warm. Kimiyo sighs in contentment and leans back to watch her children lope across yet another lawn, both of them determined to be the first one to ring the doorbell. “There’s a League party on the satellite, if you’re interested. I expect it will go late.”

“I’m beside myself with breathless anticipation. Every time I’m up there, someone wants to throw me in prison,” Arthur rumbles, resting his chin on the top of her head.

“Perhaps you should wait to go up there until you’re actually _welcome_.”

“But that could take forever,” he teases. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather stay home tonight. Someone’s gotta watch the candy and make sure that tantalizing outfit of yours gets hung up safely.”

Somehow, she’d thought as much. “I suppose it’s all for the best that we’re not going out tonight… this way, you’ll have plenty of energy in the morning to clean up the mess you’ve made in the front yard. You tend to half-ass it when you’re hung over.”

Arthur lets out a disgusted sigh at this unwelcome reminder. “ _God_ , I hate pumpkins.”


End file.
